Report: Ken Burns, Tom Hanks to team for miniseries on Jack Johnson

One of the most significant events in Reno’s history – and in the history of race relations in America – will be part of an HBO miniseries bringing together two film titans.

The website Vulture.com reported today that Oscar-winning actor Tom Hanks is teaming with filmmaker Ken Burns for a miniseries on Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight boxing champion.

Johnson’s knockout of Tommy Burns in 1908 gave him the heavyweight championship but sparked outrage among sportswriters – led by Jack London – who called for a “Great White Hope” to take back the championship.

Eventually, public pressure prompted James Jeffries, the heavyweight champion from 1899 to 1905 who had retired undefeated, to come out of retirement and face Johnson.

The Johnson-Jeffries fight, billed “The Fight of the Century,” was held on July 4, 1910 in Reno, which was then a bustling railroad town of 17,000. The fight drew a crowd of more than 20,000, filling every Reno hotel room, spare rooms of Reno homeowners, a tent city in Idlewild Park and railroad sleeper cars bought in just for the occasion.

Retired Nevada State Archivist Guy Rocha, who researched the fight extensively including pinpointing the exact location where the arena was located (Fourth and Toana streets), described the fight this way.

“It was much bigger than just a sporting event because of the racial overtones,” Rocha said. “It captivated the nation and the world.”

Johnson won the fight, knocking out Jeffries in the 15th round to retain his title. His victory sparked race riots around the country.

This will be Burns’ second film project concerning Johnson. In 2005, he produced the documentary “Unforgivable Blackness,” which aired on PBS.

Hanks has produced other miniseries for HBO, including “From the Earth to the Moon.”

The Vulture.com report said the screenplay for the miniseries will be written by Beau Willimon. Hanks and Burns will produce the film and Burns will direct it. No timetable was given for when the project will be filmed, completed or aired on HBO.

Anyone who would like to know more about the Johnson-Jeffries fight and how it was covered by Reno’s two newspapers – the Nevada State Journal and Reno Evening Gazette – can pick up the book “Johnson-Jeffries: Dateline Reno” written by longtime RGJ reporter Ray Hagar and myself and produced by the Reno Gazette-Journal in 2010 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the fight. It’s available at Sundance Bookstore.

About me

Guy Clifton is a lifelong Nevada resident, growing up in the Nye County mining town of Gabbs. He attended the University of Nevada, Reno and has worked at the Reno Gazette-Journal since 1994. He has worked in virtually every department in the newsroom over the past 18 years. He is also the author of five books on Nevada history.